Washington, Feb 20 (EFE).– Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is calling on U.S. consumers to boycott Apple’s products until the tech company unlocks an iPhone used by one of the perpetrators of the December 2015 San Bernardino, California, terrorist attack, which left 14 dead.

Trump was referring to Apple’s refusal to comply with a court order secured by the FBI, which has been unable to access the information contained in Syed Rizwan Farook’s smartphone.

Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, were killed by police after they carried out the Dec. 2 terrorist attack at a San Bernardino County public health department holiday party, where more than a score of people were also seriously injured.

“What I think you ought to do is boycott Apple until such a time as they give that security number. How do you like that? I just thought of it. Boycott Apple,” Trump told his supporters Friday at a town hall-style event in South Carolina, which is holding its Republican primary on Saturday.

Trump later fired off a series of tweets, saying “boycott all Apple products until such time as Apple gives cellphone info to authorities regarding radical Islamic terrorist couple.”

“Hopefully others will follow suit. Our country needs & should demand security. It is time to get tough & be smart!” Trump wrote.

“I use both iPhone & Samsung. If Apple doesn’t give info to authorities on the terrorists I’ll only be using Samsung until they give info,” the Republican frontrunner said.

Trump’s call for a boycott came on the same day the U.S. Justice Department filed a motion aimed at forcing Apple to immediately comply with the court order to unlock the phone.

That order was handed down Tuesday by Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym of the Federal District Court for the Federal District of California.

In its request that Pym enforce her ruling, the Justice Department questioned Apple’s motives, saying its refusal to comply “appears to be based on its concern for its business model and public brand marketing strategy.”

Police found the phone inside the vehicle that Farook, an American citizen, and his Pakistani wife, both alleged supporters of the Islamic State, were using to flee police when they were shot dead.

Apple has vowed to fight the court order, saying that the assistance the government wants would involve creating a new version of the iPhone operating system and installing it on the smartphone that was used by the shooter.

Under the current operating system, iPhones have a security system that erases their data if the passcode digits are not entered correctly after several attempts.

Federal investigators want that function deactivated so they are able to enter as many passcode combinations as necessary to gain access to the iPhone and all the information it contains.

In a letter to customers, Apple Inc. CEO Tim Cook said Wednesday that Pym’s ruling was an unprecedented step which threatens the security of our customers.”

“We oppose this order, which has implications far beyond the legal case at hand,” said Cook, whose company has until Feb. 26 to formally respond to Pym’s ruling.

The White House says the assistance from Apple would enable the FBI to access one phone in a single instance, but Cook said in his letter that “that’s simply not true.”

“Once created, the technique could be used over and over again, on any number of devices. In the physical world, it would be the equivalent of a master key, capable of opening hundreds of millions of locks – from restaurants and banks to stores and homes,” he wrote.

“No reasonable person would find that acceptable,” the CEO added.